The Making of a Muslim

Once I was asked: how do Muslim intellectuals read the Quran without noticing its obvious errors? How do they read about Mohammed’s evident murders and stand with the murderer? How do they read about his wars and stand with him, the aggressor? Since I discovered the truth about Islam, I frequently ask myself those same questions, why did I do that? When I look at Islam from where I stand today, all its lies, absurdities and cruelties appear to me with crystal clear precision, so why it took me so long to see the so obvious?

From my own personal experience, I think it has to do with what I believe to be the most extensive brainwashing process a human can ever be subjected to. The Islamization of the Muslim’s mind is a process that starts immediately after birth and continues throughout his/her life. After birth, an adult holds the child and recites the azan, the call for prayers, directly in the ears of the newborn. The moral of the practice is to prime the child‘s hearing with the blessed names of Allah and Mohammed. Indeed, that call for prayers soon becomes the most frequently heard sound by that child or any other Muslim child. The azan is repeated five times a day by every mosque in the area. If there are ten mosques in the area, which is common nowadays, the azan would be heard, through the loud speakers, fifty times a day. In addition, the newborn’s ears will get used to hearing the endless recitations of the Quran that go on almost continuously.

As the child grows up he/she will hear more and read more of the Quran. The newborn will open his/her eyes to the scenes of people performing the prayers, and will grow up to the familiar sight of walls decorated with posters of Arabic calligraphy of some Quranic verses. Those Quranic posters, Islam’s only visual art, soon become mandatory sights in his house or any house he/she may visit. Soon, the mind of the Muslim child gets the message that there is something very special about the Quran, which he/she is destined to read hundreds of times without ever understanding it.

At home and at school, Muslims children get thorough Islamic training, which is in a way similar to the training of circus animals; both respond impressively to commands without understanding why. Muslim children are trained to recite, by heart, the short chapters of the Quran and to give pre formulated answers to specific questions like who your god is and who your prophet is. In addition to this, children are introduced to basic Islamic logic in the form of hypothetical arguments designed to convince a child about Islam. Interestingly, most Muslims will still use those same arguments to defend their religion even when they are adults.

The following are some of the ‘logical arguments’ that are used to make the young child believe that Allah exists and that Islam is the only accepted religion.

Consider the table, the chair or the car, do they create themselves? Obviously not, some people make them. The same is true for a man; is it possible for a man to create himself? Obviously not. The creator of man is Allah, is that difficult to understand? Obviously not, but the atheists are stupid enough not to understand this! To a child, this sounds convincing enough.

Consider that your father bought a new radio or television; doesn’t he need a book to explain all about the equipment? Obviously he does, this is why all new equipments have manuals that explain their functions. It is the manufactures who know everything about their products. The same is true for man; it is only Allah who knows all about man, therefore we must read and abide by His book, the Quran, which is like the manual that explains how we should manage our lives. Is that difficult to understand? Obviously not, but there are people, the infidels, who are stupid enough to put their own earthy laws in preference to Allah’s laws in the Quran.

The pre Islamic Arabs worshiped figures made from stones. Are stones worth worshipping? Would you believe that stones created man? Obviously not. This is just one example that demonstrates the ignorance and stupidity of the Arabs before Islam. In addition, the pre Islamic Arabs practiced wa’ad of girls (burial of female newborns alive) and adultery on a wide scale. The Arabs were destined to remain in darkness if it wasn’t for Mohammed who transformed them to become the best nation in the world.

Other nations outside Arabia worshiped the sun, the fire, the cow etcetera. Do those religions make sense to you? Obviously not, any sane person would realize the stupidity of such beliefs. It doesn’t take a genius to discover that Islam is the right religion and the others are just man made cults.

Christianity and Judaism: they were true religions, but were altered. Their scriptures were manipulated by men. Would any of you believe that Allah can have a son? Obviously not, but look at how many millions out there who believe so. Consider the history of Jews and the troubles they caused to the world, consider why they are so much hated by all nations, and consider why Allah has sent so many prophets to them because they keep changing their scriptures. Would you trust or believe a religion that comes from the Jews? Of course not.

Conclusion: The only religion that makes sense is Islam.

Muslim children become completely convinced that Islam is the right religion and they cannot come to terms with the fact that there are people who follow other religions despite the damming evidence against them. They learn that ‘Alkufr Inad’ which means that all infidels know deep in their hearts that Islam is the right religion but they reject it to avoid the humiliation of appearing to be wrong. Muslims feel lucky to be born as Muslims, hence their common maxim in Arabic ‘Al hamdu lilahi al ni’mati el Islam’, meaning praise be to Allah for blessing us with Islam. With so much luck, Muslims feel they should be thankful to Allah by devoting their lives for His worshipping.

Muslim intellectuals spend years reading and learning the Quran without ever noticing any of its errors, which are cleverly camouflaged in a background of deliberate errors and abnormalities. The Quran’s errors and contradictions just blend well in its general image of being an abnormal book.

The Quran is made to look abnormal because of the excessive use of diacritical marks, which are used scarcely in other books. It is also made to look abnormal because it is not printed in the usual Arabic fonts and doesn’t follow the Arabic writing rules, which makes it look as if it contains excessive typographical errors. From the Muslims’ point of view, the disorganised Quran, with all its repetitions, contradictions and errors are just proofs of its divinity because humans do not write books in such ways.

Muslim scholars continue to stress on the eloquence of the Quran. They stun their audience by discussing in details the use of particular words in particular verse to deliver a precise meaning. They carefully avoid discussing the controversial verses and claim that the repetitions are there for a purpose. They claim that the same verse may have a different resonance in the Muslims’ hearts, depending on its location.

How Muslims learn about Mohammed

Islam emphasises the perfect image of Mohammed, who is portrayed as the best man Allah ever created, or will ever create, to the end of time. Mohammed is considered as an extraordinary blessing from the moment he was born; he was perfect even as a child. His name, which means highly praised, was an extraordinarily beautiful name not used by the Arabs before, as if it was reserved for Mohammed (see note1). The following are some examples of the blessings of Mohammed, which Muslims learn (see note 2):

Mohammed’s wet nurse, Halima, noticed she started to produce more milk after breast feeding Mohammed (we wonder why his mother, Amina, did not enjoy such blessing!)

Mohammed never told a lie as a boy.

Mohammed was known as Al Ameen (the trust worthy) in Mecca. And that was before he became a prophet (see note3).

Mohammed was capable of solving a problem of how to put the black stone in its place. Mohammed’s solution was so genius that averted a civil war among the Arabs.

Mohammed was oppressed in Mecca after he became a prophet, but he was so kind that he refused to ask Allah to punish the Meccan, as some prophets did to their people (see note 4).

Everywhere in Islamic teachings, Mohammed is portrayed as a man of high morality who stood by his principles, a hero who defended the rights of the oppressed and the poor, an enlightened man who waged wars against backwardness and corruption.

When Muslim scholars discuss any of Mohammed’s murders, they choose a special language that helps the Muslims’ conscious to remain untouched. The murder of Asma Bintu Marwan was one of the many disturbing assassinations ordered by Mohammed. All those disturbing murders are cleverly removed from the center of attention in Mohammed’s sira (biography) and kept away in the shade. Most ordinary Muslims don’t even notice them, but even if they do, they do not realize the scale of his cruelty. As an example, this is how ordinary Muslims would read about Mohammed’s assassination of Asma Bintu Marwan:

(Bintu Marwan was an evil woman whose heart was filled with hatred towards Allah and his messenger, peace be upon him. She expressed her evil feelings openly in rude poetry that caused too much offence to the messenger of Allah, peace be upon him. The messenger of Allah asked his companions: who would stop Bintu Marwan’s evil actions for me? One of his companions, Omayr, said: “O the messenger of Allah, I will stop her for you” and when that man came back that night, after employing Allah’s judgement on the evil woman, he prayed in the mosque then told Allah’s messenger, peace be upon him, of what he did. The messenger of Allah, peace be upon him, said: “not even two goats would fight over it. Then, peace be upon him, turned to his companions and said: “if any of you wants to see a man who is a helper to Allah and his messenger, he should look at Omayr ”)

From the beginning, the victim was made criminal. The word murder was not even mentioned anywhere and the whole story was made to look as if Mohammed was performing a religious ritual.

It caught my eyes when I read about Mohammed’s marriage to Safeya Bintu Huyai. This took place in Khayber where the Jewish tribe of Banu Nadeer were raided in the early hours of the day(imagine how merciful that was!) and defeated by the Muslim warriors. The palm trees were set on fire, the chief of the tribe was tortured and killed and women and children were taken as war booties, called sabaya (slaves).

When the battle was over, Duhya, one of the companions, came to Mohammed and asked his permission to take one of the captured women to be his own slave, to which Mohammed approved. A short while later, a group of very jealous sahaba complained that the woman was actually the wife of the chief of the tribe, who was just murdered, and was very beautiful. Mohammed ordered the woman to be brought to him; he looked at her and was stunned by her beauty. Muslims’ books describe the scene as this:“The prophet, peace be upon him, threw his gown on her as a sign that he selected her( Istafaha) for himself”. The word Istafa means selected and is usually used to describe blessed selections. Muslims scholars go even further and describe this rape as an act of mercy! They praise Mohammed’s high morality towards his enemy’s wife by offering her two golden opportunities that retain her status; Islam and becoming the prophet’s wife! Indeed, Safyia accepted Mohammed’s offer (the alternative was to remain as Duhya’s slave) and joined Mohammed’s other harem in holding the title the ‘mother of the believers’.

I find it particularly shocking that intellectual Muslims read the story and become touched by Mohammed’s high morality and mercy towards his enemies. I discussed the story with many Muslims, and was amazed at how many of them actually didn’t notice that Safyia’s husband was brutally murdered only a few hours earlier. Their minds were so impressed by Mohammed’s ‘high morality’ to notice Safyia’s ordeal. They were too busy praising Mohammed’s morality to notice that even wild animals do not think of sex after all those scenes of the blood bath that resulted in the actual extinction of an entire tribe.

Although Muslims spend their lives reading about Islam but they never read it with objectivity. The Muslims’ minds and senses are crippled when it comes to objective reading of Islam. It may not be possible to undo a life time’s process of extensive indoctrination by reading a critical article. Islamic indoctrination is an abuse of human minds and there is an urgent need to tell Muslims the truth by systematically and consistently exposing its lies.

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Notes:

(Note 1)There were a few named Mohammed, so our Mohammed was not the first. In the sixth century Arabia, rumours were circulating that a prophet will be borne and his name will be Mohammed, therefore, some Arabs started to name their children Mohammed. Others acquired the name after they claimed to be prophets and this is probably how Mohammed acquired his name. There are reports that Mohammed’s original name was Quthem but there is no way confirming either claim. There is evidence that Mohammed had the habit of changing the names of his companions to more suitable names, like Abu Bakr’s name.

(Note 2)None of the above claims can be confirmed.

(Note 3)Al Ameen (Trusworthy) is a title that used to be given to a person who looks after a trade, like saying the treasurer. If the claim is true, which probably is not, Mohammed probably earned it when he looked after Khadija’s trade business.

(Note 4) The claim that Mohammed was oppressed in Mecca is simply not true. Please read MA Khan’s Islamic Jihad: a legacy of forced conversion, Imperialism and Slavery (Chapter 3).